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MARCH IS, 1957.
THE BULLETIN OF THE CATHOLIC LAYMEN’S ASSOCIATION OF GEORGIA
FIFTEEN
BOOK REVIEWS
EDITED BY EILEEN HALL
3087 Old Jonesboro Road, Hapeville, Georgia
Each issue of ihis Book Page
is confided io the paironage of
Mary, Mediatrix of All Graces,
with the hope that every read
er and every contributor may
be specially favored by her
and her Divine Son.
biography
ADVENTURER SAINTS, by
Abbe Ome.r Englebert, translated
bv Dona] O’Kelly, (Kenedy $4.00).
‘“The five subjects of this book re
semble each other in that they
V '-’ere all adventurers,” the author
S 2ys in his Foreword. One might
■Question, "Are not all saints ad
venturers?” and Abbe Englebert
practically admits that they are
when he continues, “. . . the saint
always answers, the divine call
without calculating the risk. In
this sense he is, of all men, the
most adventurous . . . he burns
his bridges behind him and com
mits himself without reservation
to his great adventurer . . . renews
his determination at every cross
road he meets, and follows his
chosen path until death comes to
him.”
Granted, then, that every saint
is in some sense an adventurer,
the stories of these five—Joan of
Arc, Martin of Tours, Peter Chan
el, Giles of Assisi and Junipero
Serra — are certain to appeal
strong!y to the adventurous spirit
of youth. Each lived in a different
century; Martin died in 397; Giles
in 1261; Joan in 1431-; Junipero in
1784 (in California); and Peter in
1841 (on a remote island of the
South Pacific; he had wanted to
be a missionary to America). Two
were Franciscans; one a , Marist.
Three were priests; one a lay
brother. Joan is the only woman
and the only non-religious. She
died a martyr; so did Peter Chan
el. Abbe Englebert lets their own
writings, or writings of their con
temporaries, tell most of the sto
ry. In Joan’s case, this results in
some confusion because of the
many persons who are named
without being properly introduc
ed to the reader. Maps showing
the travels of these five would
have enhanced their stories and
made their adventures more easy
to follow.
THESE WOMEN WALKED
WITH GOD, by Rev. M. Raymond,
O.C.S.O., (Bruce $3.95). Trappist
Father Raymond of the Abbey of
Gethsemani in Kentucky (mother-
house of the Georgia Abbey of
Our Lady of the Holy Ghost),
chooses 15 women who were con
nected in one way or another
with his own Cistercian Order in
its early days, and dedicates his
book about them “to Mary Im
maculate, Queen of Citeaux,
Mother of all Cistercians, and to
the community of Mount St.
Mary’s Abbey at Wrentham, Mas
sachusetts, the pioneer Trappis-
tines of the U.S.A.” Like all of
his other books, this is a book
of meditations; not straight bio
graphy.
Noting that “lack of humility,
lack of simplicity and lack of
obedience” were the bane of their
century as well as of our own,
he moralizes: “That is why these
women who lived and died 700
years ago are as modern as this
morning and have a message
more timely than anything you
will find in tomorrow’s paper.”
These 15 Cistercian women, he
says, “step out of the long dead
past, stand before you and say
that in the situation you face
there is nothing new except, per
haps, your own confusion.” All
of them are enchanting women,
each in her own individual way.
Personally, we find St. Hedwig,
wife, mother and widow, Cister
cian saint although never a Cis
tercian nun, by far the most en
chanting of them all.
PERFECT FRIEND, the Life of
Blessed Claude La Colombiere,
S.J., by Georges Guitton, S.J.,
translated by William J. Young,
S.J., (Herder $6.00). St. Margaret
Mary Alacoque, Visitation nun of
Paray-le-Monial, through whom
Our Lord appealed for devotion
to His Sacred Heart, is better
known than her saintly Jesuit spi
ritual director whom Jesus Him
self described to her as “my
faithful servant and perfect
friend.” Yet Blessed Claude,
whose vocation was not to the
cloister but “to live in a perfect
detachment of affection in the
midst of the world,” is actually
more appealing and more imitable
to more people than the secluded
visionary of Paray. No less than
his penitent, the Jesuit priest was
essential to Jesus “for the glory
of His Sacred Heart,” as He made
perfectly clear to Margaret Mary.
“He showed me His Sacred
Heart,” she wrote, “like a burning
furnace and two others which
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were going to be united with it
and lost in that abyss, saying: ‘It
is thus that My pure love unites
these three hearts for ever.’ ”
This 440-page-long biography
of Blessed Claude, for all its
scholarliness, reveals the “faith
ful servant and perfect friend” of
Jesus as indeed a most attractive
personality. The first half of the
biography is a fascinating account
of the growth of Claude’s spiritual
life and of his inspired direction
of St. Margaret Mary and other
religious souls. The rest shows the
holy and lovable Jesuit during his
years in London, as preacher to
the Duchess of York, his near
martyrdom during the “Papist
Terror of 1678” and finally his
immolation and exile in France,
his “priceless treasure” of abjec
tion and intense suffering preced
ing his death in 1682.
IMAGE BOOKS
PARENTS, CHILDREN AND
THE FACTS OF LIFE, by Henry
V. Sattler, C.Ss.R., Ph.D„ 65c—
complete and unabridged edition
of a book originally published by
St. Anthony Guild in 1953. The
author provides parents and oth
ers who have the responsibility of
instructing the young a carefully
planned approach to the delicate
but vitally essential subject of
sex instruction, explaining just
what should be taught and when,
as well as the proper attitute of
respect and reverence for the God-
given powers of human reproduc
tion. He considers separately the
religious, moral, emotional, psy
chological and physiological prin
ciples of Catholic sex education,
quoting frequently from papal di
rectives “On the Christian Educa
tion of Youth,” “On Christian
Marriage” and “Guiding Christ’s
Little* Ones,” as well as other de
pendable authorities. Questions
and discussion aids are given at
the end of each chapter.
A weak intellect doesn’t keep a
man from being headstrong.
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